Friends of Bill W.

[LeftWriteFemme]

August 31

CHANNELING


It’s a full feeling to be a channel. Only an empty feeling when it’s blocked at the base of my spine and God can’t go to my head. The river flows through me and my banks will hold. Excuses dam me up and leave a dry and lifeless basin, with tributaries taxed for usefulness. Staying in the groove conveys my Higher Power’s will without need of my furrowed brow. A hose with no water running is a place for spiders to spin. If I shut off to service, I am a breeding ground for creeping sadness and shocking misery. Compliance allows me the view of flowing strength and rushing joy, the greatest of which is living with intent.


Repeat until you chant.
*


Shadow of Doubt


The long dark cast covers my face,
my thoughts…….. my life;
it is the light blocked by my skepticism.

To tear down the obstruction
means a profound change of my internal architecture;
walls will have to be knocked down, windows installed.

The poor mouthed structure
takes better to the steamroller than I wish it would.
I fear the loss of my hideout,
panic at the thought of a life in the sun.

Skepticism builds a paper world;
opaque, weak yet frightening to tear apart.



You are reading selections from Sober on the Way to Sane and More Lines From My Life by Sherrie Theriault

[LeftWriteFemme]

September 1

ORIGAMI


I fold my reality like origami, each day a shape to suit my whim. A dog when I feel like begging. A horse when I want to trot away. A pot to brew up some potion. A penguin when I feel cold and I stand on my egg all day. I can bend and flex, change my image, but in the end I am truly flat and lifeless, a construct of imagination, but soulless and boring. Reality cannot be my creation made in the accordion of my mind. Truth and breath come like the wind and I need to let them change direction and change me, too.


Turn right both ways.
*


Here Kitty kitty

Litter training the lynx seems like a good idea
until it is accomplished
and all concerned are less for the accomplishment.

Domesticity is a transparent cage,
which has a presence felt by all
whether loved or hated.

The air is changed and the cat stifles,
everyone is safer, so it is said,
but what are we safer from?

And what is a broken lynx,
certainly not a house cat?




You are reading selections from Sober on the Way to Sane and More Lines From My Life by Sherrie Theriault

[LeftWriteFemme]

September 2

PROMISE BROKEN


If promise shatters without anyone touching it, if it pops like a floating soap bubble that lost its cohesion, what do I do? Name names? I can’t even take fingerprints. Sometimes dreams just end. No fault or blame is attached. The ice breaks under its own weight and nothing can be done. I am more than just holding on. I am alive even if all the promises melt away. I can accept the unexpected and the unasked for and still know this doesn’t affect my worth. My value is intact regardless of disappointment or discontent. I have learned that anticipation is mere amusement; promises are pleasantries. I am made of stronger stuff. I am not broken by words, ideas or hope. Promise can be broken but it doesn’t break me.


Open the mental crayon box.
*


Where’s Your Chair?


Is the ring more unnatural for the tamer or the lion?
One the trapped, the other the trapper.
Who is the more in danger;
the one with loss of freedom
or the one with possible loss of life?

And while this question is still in play
the next question is begged. Why is there a ring?
What is worth the price paid
by the whip holder or the whipped?

Spectacle is a thing whose cost
reaches from the forest to the trees;
can take you from the highest rung
down to your knees.

All this lost for some Owwe’s and Ah’s
from people needing diversion
from the ring they turn tricks in.



You are reading selections from Sober on the Way to Sane and More Lines From My Life by Sherrie Theriault

[LeftWriteFemme]

September 3

HARD TIME



Sometimes I pack the earth down so hard that weeds can’t even grow up through. I try to make nature inert. I try to kill my alcoholism. I confine my disease to this tiny path of compacted dirt and wear blinders as to warn off distractions. I forget there is a garden to be grown in the fertile ground of my recovering mind. Losing the compulsion to drink is a gift; stopping my mind from thinking is soul murder. I can sink my toes in the good brown soil and look to the lilies and the Queen Anne’s lace for inspiration. I can stop giving myself such a hard time.


Let art talk.
*



FIVE FINGERS THAT GOBBLE
It only takes five crayons
to turn a tracing of my hand into a turkey
and it only takes a few things to change
my drunken life into my sober life.

Looking back I am amazed
how little it has actually taken to transform my life.
My drunkenness looks about as much like my sobriety
as my hand looks like a turkey
but the transformation has taken place.

The red, the yellow, the brown,
the meetings, the steps, the sponsor, these basics are the bulk.
Sometimes it’s the small extras
that help push this work of art into the realm of believability.

Accents of green, up and down the fingers,
or a few bonus phone calls to women outside my network.
Anything can be the thing that kicks it over
into a plausible and convincing reality.

I can never be more than I am, a drunk is always a drunk
and a hand is still just a hand,
but within each of these things are unimagined
possibilities waiting to be explored.

Michelangelo believed that sculptures lurked in chunks of stone.
I have come to see that a sober woman
prowled inside this drunk
and every Thanksgiving my hand yearns to put on feathers once again.



You are reading selections from Sober on the Way to Sane and More Lines From My Life by Sherrie Theriault

[LeftWriteFemme]

September 5

DO NOT BE A FRAUD

“Fake it ‘til you make it" is like saying "keep drinking ‘til you get sober,” complains my sponsor.
“But what about the things I can’t do yet?" I ask.
“You work on them; that’s all. You work. You adjust your attitude, practice the steps, carry your behind to meetings and talk with me and the other people in your network.”
"Yeah, that sounds like a breeze."
“Easier than staying sober while lying. In this program we try to stay in the moment and be honest. Pretending to feel differently than you do at any given time defeats your ability to be present and makes it hard for people to trust you.”
“But it’s so awkward,” I grumble.
“Which is why we of the alcoholic persuasion try to find short cuts, but don’t get sucked into them. Tell the truth and do the hard work of sobriety, and stay away from the persons who try to sell you a softer way.”


Let people give advice to you, never take it from them.
*

No Reason

Reason falls through,
where it lands is a place of unknown
seascape and unrelenting tides.

The roar in my ears furthers the disorienting effect of relocation.
At first it seems easier to let go of reason
but when I descend into madness I scramble for purchase;
looking for sanity like a cleft in a cliff.

Loss of skin and blood is nothing to compare to the loss of my mind.
I believe I could be more easily separated from a limb or two
than to lose rein on my brain.

Reason falls through;
I must follow even though the terrain is arduous
and my heart is sometimes faint,
for without reason there is no reason
and without reason there is no life.



You are reading selections from Sober on the Way to Sane and More Lines From My Life by Sherrie Theriault

[LeftWriteFemme]

September 8

WILL YOU GET TO THE OTHER SIDE?



Chickens stand together on the edge of the road pecking and scratching; people make fun. People tell jokes but it’s not so funny when we are the ones playing on the tracks. We forget that all the excuses about longing for excitement and not wanting to be cut off from the world sound like so much cackling to the ears of people who value their lives. Life in the pasture or the backyard is fulfilling if you want it. That kind of life is no adrenaline rush, but then again isn’t adrenaline just another drug?


Tell the truth as if it were the weather.
*


Helping Hands?


Why would you go to a rattler for a snakebite remedy?
It feels so much like the hair of the dog that bit me.
The truth is I must, must stay away from the quick answers.

I am a slow healer, but I do heal if I allow myself to do so
unencumbered by poison or untruth.
When I am returning to the vomit of my past
it is incumbent upon me to search for the old lies
and/or the new ones, either or both will get me drunk;
do I even need the help of a prescription pad?



You are reading selections from Sober on the Way to Sane and More Lines From My Life by Sherrie Theriault

[LeftWriteFemme]

September 9

HARVEST TIMING


The harvest fits in the growing season and the oak fits inside the acorn. My sober mind fits right in my sober time. The soul of everything rubs across the hind leg of a cricket to sing. The infinite machinery of the universe spins but you stand there questioning the existence of a Higher Power. Well, that’s who you are, but I have only one question for you. Who else could have made all the best tomatoes come from Jersey?


Catch rain on your face.
*


Barnum, Bailey & Me


When I wake to find a whip and a chair by the side of my bed
I know I am in for a circus of a day
and the tears of this clown will not change a thing.

I ready myself for the tightrope walk
and watch out for stray elephants.
All the trained poodles in the world
can’t make this into a day in the park.

Painted ponies prance through their paces;
I try to stick to my own act,
meanwhile remembering that no matter how difficult
these routines may be it still beats a seat in the stands.



You are reading selections from Sober on the Way to Sane and More Lines From My Life by Sherrie Theriault

[LeftWriteFemme]

September 10

DO YOU HEAR THAT SOUND?



I was running on empty and thought I was getting along that way but the smoke gave me away. My life had caught on fire and I burned it to the ground. I thought nothing had been apparent until it all lay in ashes. My sponsor said, “No, we all knew when your tank ran dry. The sucking sound could be heard for miles around.”
I asked her, if that were true, why I hadn’t heard it myself?
She said, she guessed I had my denial turned up too loud.


Box a gift to be set free at a later date.

*

Oh the Wells Fargo Wagon


Tying myself to one rail of a set of railroad tracks
gets me the same results as tying myself to the other.
Swapping one chemical fix for another
is like changing my socks in a rainstorm,
nothing dry will come of it.

Not seeing potential harm does not eliminate the harm.
Like a child with my hands pressed firmly over my eyes I yell,
“You can’t see me,” and run headlong into disaster.

Whether the train comes and makes a mess or not
I make my own soup Ducky
and must get on track by staying off the rails.



You are reading selections from Sober on the Way to Sane and More Lines From My Life by Sherrie Theriault

[LeftWriteFemme]

September 11

YES, THAT TOO



When kindness becomes a weakness, when mental agility becomes emotional instability, it’s time to reassess everything. I cannot leave any thing off my inventory because my grandma, or society or the preacher says it’s a good thing to be. Every blessing can be a curse; all my characteristics have their dark side. I have to list the entirety of my cargo and keep a watchful eye. I have to moderate my investment in all my abilities or I could lose myself. Warmth is nice but I don’t want Death Valley. Integrity requires balance or depraved indifference will be the outcome. Weak and strong, right and wrong, it all goes on the scale.


Be generous with yourself, then others.

*


Louet


Consolidating fuzz into yarn
makes me a friend to sheep everywhere.
Spinning the filaments of truth into cables of life
does not impress the mutton in anyway,
but sure does my mental health a world of good.

Free floating fiber is bad for my lungs
and piles lint all around.
Giving things a firm twist
pulls together what used to be fluff
and keeps me warm and dry.


You are reading selections from Sober on the Way to Sane and More Lines From My Life by Sherrie Theriault

[LeftWriteFemme]

September 12

WHY NOT HOME?



Power is not production and production is not art. I have to keep pulling the car over to the side of the road so I don’t miss the train of words sent to me from out of the dark blue life I am on the edge of living. But I still want to go home. I will never give up these roadside excursions into the river of thought, though I do wonder why the cable shoved into my house never gets this channel? Why is the connection so strong on the bus not the bed? The minefields of thought explosions seem seeded anywhere as long as it’s at least five miles away. Power is not production and production is not art. I let it pour through me; it’s not mine to sort.


Learn to read God’s handwriting.

*

Hypothetical


Is my inability to understand what creates mystery?
If I were brighter, swifter, keener,
would life be free of unknown communion?

Would comprehension eliminate revelation?
Would I lose perceptual apprehension
by arming myself with knowledge of forethought?

Could I end mysticism through education?
Should I even if I could?



You are reading selections from Sober on the Way to Sane and More Lines From My Life by Sherrie Theriault

[LeftWriteFemme]

September 6

FUNK AND WAGNALL’S BACK PORCH



Bottoms come sealed in envelopes from unknown accountants. Amazing how many nominees and how few winners! The audience, filled with past recipients, holds its collective breath and prays for this year's finalists, and prays a bigger prayer of thanks to this year's donors, the ones who prove with their lives that it hasn’t gotten better out there. The speeches are the same, a gratitude list and maybe a punch line, the smiles and tears fresh but familiar. And when the lights go out on this night, the days of diligence begin once again so no one need lose their seat and we can all celebrate here, next year, together.


Open even though the hinges are hidden.
*

Nightcrawlers and Nightingales



I wriggle blind eyed through the dirt;
friction, my friend giving me something to push against,
resistance aiding my travels.

I worm my way through life
and believed that was all there was; having never seen the sky.
I traveled far and wide once I had taken to the air.

Open eyed I push against a thing I cannot see
and peer down on the dirt I left behind.
I soar rather than struggle
and go the distance leaving my mind open to the next frontier.



You are reading selections from Sober on the Way to Sane and More Lines From My Life by Sherrie Theriault

[LeftWriteFemme]

September 7


THE FRUIT BOWL


Meetings are living and precious fruit. I must squeeze every drop from them, even the lemons. I am privileged to be among the succulent growth and pungent fragrance of determined hearts and minds. The infusion of strength, the vitality received from the essence of truth gives and gives to me. I am refreshed by exposure to raw talent, revived by action and growth. The diversity of shape and flavor cheer and inspire me. The contrast from bowl to chalice is dramatic, ever a reminder to stay where it’s fresh.


An offer is better than a gift.

*

Genius



I am often bonded to a self which thinks I know everything
and when in doubt believes I should know even if I don’t.
Freeing me of this requires the constant support
of friends and neighbors’ assuring me that in a capricious world
willingness is a more practical resource;
it packs neatly and handles most jobs with aplomb.

Staying consistently free from the bondage of self
requires truckloads of willingness
and the spirit of humility and sometimes even forgiveness.
I am freer when I like myself,
for the true bondage of self is the hatred of self.



You are reading selections from Sober on the Way to Sane and More Lines From My Life by Sherrie Theriault

[LeftWriteFemme]

September 4

WATERLINE



The interface of water and land is compelling. Soothing but dramatic; I’m drawn to this transition. I stand and watch the lap, lap, lapping of the liquid to the land. The gift of one place to another calls me. Change and transition exhilarate my senses. Whether it is rock or sand, river or sea I feel the pull to watch life in response. Boundaries are beautiful. Borders allow safety and recreation, not just risk. When I embrace this in life I embrace it in me.


Do it twice, once with the pattern and once without.
*



The Naked Not the Dead


Because comfort is sometimes no comfort
I can shave my hair and walk bare in the naked world.
Removing pretense helps in unexpected ways.

Foolish action becomes formulaic
when you are scared or hurt.
I lived through the summers of blood;
the winter is not enough to stem the tide or heal the wound.

I have no want to raise the dead,
but how to save the living?
Poverty is the inheritance of so much misguided lethargy
and I must shear off the illusion of maturity
and let the children speak.



You are reading selections from Sober on the Way to Sane and More Lines From My Life by Sherrie Theriault

[LeftWriteFemme]

March 25

Two X’s

I play sport at the three X folks and their still sometimes skewed thinking. Yet, I attack myself for feeling like a babe in the woods. Old and wise should be my stock and trade by now though I find vastness at my door regularly and confidence struggles to peek in the window. What in the world will I do if I can’t perfect this stuff soon? Hopefully nothing as foolish as fretting or anything as mean spirited as accusation, possibly I could try reception. Truly this only comes in gift wrap and after twenty years I would hope I had learned to live in the present.


Think kindly of chickens if not of cowards

*

THE ORPHANAGE OF MY HEART

The orphanage of my heart hold many children of the past
They gaze at me
Fixed in an attempt to draw me near their needs

I scurry, often my head down, eyes averted
Not knowing how to offer comfort or consideration
To these hapless souls.

Fearing the largess of poverty
I decline to open my small purse
What could I tender
Other than a tease?

Nearly barren, in my heartbroken, disconsolate, inconsolable state,
I rarely even obligate myself to extending my hand
This is the pit of my idiocy

These wee ones have the world of hope and strength to give
I am their offertory
I am the place where their gold resides
They live inside me to fill me and bind me to life and light

I flee them in the height of misunderstanding
Disconnected from these inner spirits I am impoverished
And far too weak to grasp their help

I too fogged to see the world within
Starve in the world without


You are reading selections from More Sober on the Way to Sane and Lines From My Life by Sherrie Theriault

[LeftWriteFemme]

March 27

New Borne

What happens when you finally get what you want, what you barely dared to dream? What happens when you can hardly do more than drip tears down from smiling eyes? Where do you go with a future filled with proposed joy? Heaven is an option if only you believed, but hell has been such a perennial destination it’s hard to realize there will be no return trip this year or possibly ever again. The work required to change from an attitude of longing to one of satisfaction is as real as all the work needed thus far. Tending love is a host of disciplines I want to step to, like I have done it all my life, like I was born to do it and I was, yet, still growth is accompanied by its own pain and awkwardness and who am I to deny this treat. Any new life worth living is worth the pain to bear it.


Turn up your smile

*
FEELINGS

Getting my feelings back
Was like a package delivered.
Not a letter bomb
More like live squid or bait of some kind
It was something to catch me out there.

I think overcoming the shock
Was more or less the small part
Though it seemed to loom at the time.
The squirming, the writhing of my soul
Was like a pregnancy following a bad dream.

I wondered how this became a part of me.
I squandered my days
Hoping it would leave quietly some night soon.
Like all difficult relationships
I attempted to hold my breath through it.

Failing this, I tried to offer my feelings a guest wing in my heart
And a never ending supply of tea and cookies.
When the reality of life with feelings planted itself firmly in me
I let out my breath, stopped the hostess act
And endeavored to roll with it.

This worked well.
I have since invested in a wet-suit and fins
The squid are much easier to live with
When I meet them on their turf.


You are reading selections from More Sober on the Way to Sane and Lines From My Life by Sherrie Theriault